The Bitter Snow
by Shinonomisensei
Summary: Sometimes you find the love of your life when things seem their darkest. Mattie will find his true love, but will he trust his heart. M for smut later on.
1. Chapter 1

**Author's note: Holy crap I'm actually writing a multi chapter fic! This will get M rated for smut eventually I promise. I always write smut. XD If you like it I'll continue, if not *shrugs* who knows.**

**Thanks- Shinonomisensei**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Hetalia, or the characters, or the countries, and bad things happen in this fic...so yup not for kids.**

A soft sigh was heard through the still room. A long pale arm stretched skyward as the bed's occupant grumbled gently. It was time to get up, but Matthew Williams had absolutely no desire to do so.

Long naked legs slid from beneath warm plush covers and toes gingerly met the chilly floor. A wince was visible on his face. No one really liked to leave the warmth and comfort of their bed in the morning and he was no exception.

Toes eventually met slippers and jammed in, searching for warmth. Matthew reluctantly stood stretching again. Blinking slowly and stifling a yawn the Canadian began to revisit conscious thought. It was at this moment that he discovered….he had absolutely no clue where he was.

* * *

Obnoxious laughter could be heard down the hall. _Great_, Matthew thought, _my brother's already here_. _I love him, but man is he annoying. _Chuckling lightly to himself about the idea of his brother being unable to make a sound for a day, the young blond made his way down the hall and into the room where several nations were already convened for the start of this meeting. The strangest part was that it had absolutely nothing to do with national affairs. That should have been a tip off to Matthew, but he went out of a sense of duty anyway.

Upon entering the room he noted the typical surroundings. Alfred was loudly chattering away at anyone and everyone, but he was perched on Ivan's lap much to the pleasure of the Russian. It was rare to see a REAL smile on his face, but boy was he sporting one right now. It looked as though it was taking all of the Russian's efforts not to throw the American down and….._Ugh…no! I don't want to think about my brother's sex life….again._

Arthur was sitting primly in a chair by the window reading something that Matthew couldn't see from his position by the door. Francis was trying his best to get the Englishman's attention. If you looked carefully you could see the slight twitch of Arthur's eye.

Lovino was being hugged to Antonio's chest, much to the dismay of the violent Italian. Feliciano was snuggling up to Ludwig who, for once, was sitting comfortably with his arm around him and acting as though it didn't bother him.

Roderich was sitting next to Vash. Both wore a pale blush on their faces as they spoke quiet words of what Matthew could only assume was love.

Yao and Kiku were sitting in a corner of the room chatting about something that Matthew couldn't understand. He was never talented with Asian languages. He only knew enough to get by.

As Matthew scanned the room's occupants, he began to notice a huge trend; All those present were in a relationship, excluding himself of course, and all of them were male.

Before he had any more time to ponder this, Ludwig stood up.

"Now, I'm sorry that I had to call you all here today for something that was not related to work." The German began. "It seems that we have a problem on our hands."

Matthew looked around the room at the other nations, but returned his gaze as the German continued.

"Recently our 'bosses' have decided to interfere with our personal business. They are concerned about the well being of our countries, but they are now trying to ban us from being in a relationship with another one of….'us'."

Matthew blinked a bit. This really didn't concern him, did it? He wasn't involved with anyone despite a crush or two through the years. All of which proved unfruitful. The worst was Ivan. The Canadian boy had fallen hard for the tall pale Russian. It made things so much worse when his idiot brother started dating him. It did absolutely nothing for his self esteem, but Matthew still hoped that there would be someone for him too.

"This is why we have joined here today to discuss something very important: marriage."

Matthew's eyes nearly fell out of their sockets. Marriage? What the hell? No everyone would be bound together even more and he would **still** be left out of the majority.

There was some murmuring at the comment and several nations seemed to be quite pleased by this idea. Some even asked, poorly and not romantically in the least, if their partners would do them the honor of joining in marriage. The worst was when Ivan stood up sliding Alfred off his lap and into his seat. Ivan bent down on one knee as the others looked on and pulled a small box out of his pocket.

Matthew was ready to hyperventilate. The man that he was madly in love with for a horrible amount of time was proposing to his brother. Tears began to cloud his eyes as he watched the exchange between the two.

"Alfred. I know we have had our differences and we will likely continue to, but I know that I can not live without you. I need you in my life. I love you. Will you do me the honor of being my husband."

Alfred looked at Ivan with huge eyes as he nodded his head without words.

That was it. Matthew jumped from his seat and took off down the hallway without a backward glance. Manners be damned, he was dying a little inside from that loving exchange. It could have been him. His heart ached as he ran entirely unable to see where he was headed. Now what he needed was to forget.

* * *

Although it seems a bit out of character, Matthew was known to attend a rave or two from time to time. This was one of those times. Being a nation, he knew just who to get in touch with so that he could at least drown his sorrows for a little while.

A short few hours later the Canadian was twirling around under glow stick lighting. It was great to move and dance, but it just wasn't quite doing the trick. He made a point to go off in search of "the doc." He always knew what would fix him up. A little "medicine" to ease the pain and relax the mind was what he needed, and it was working well. He even found himself dancing with new people…although they were human and had no idea what he really was. A few of them even bought him a drink. Things were going well until a rather tipsy Russian man entered the fray and began hitting on him. He was certainly no Ivan. Tall and broad yes, but he lacked that something that was purely Braginsky. The Canadian's mind rewound to the afternoon and tears began streaming down his face. _Damn. I thought a little pot and some alcohol would help kill the edge._ He thought angrily. _Well…if I'm going to drown my sorrows, then I'm going to really drown them._

It was soon after that Matthew decided to leave the rave. A large bottle of alcohol sounded really appealing. His recent beverage of choice had become vodka. He began wondering if that's what Ivan's kisses tasted like, so it became a comfort to him.

Some time later, Matthew was wandering around entirely drunk still toting the empty vodka bottle in his arms lovingly. His only thoughts revolved around his aching heart and his lucky brother. He sat down on a bench near the point of passing out. He only just heard a voice ask the question: "Mattie, is that you?"

The man looked at the inebriated blond on the park bench in surprise. What the hell happened? He had gotten a call to go look for Matthew if he was able to, but by the looks of it things were much worse than they had let on. Scooping the Canadian up gently he began to trudge home.


	2. Chapter 2

Now that he had discovered that he was in a bedroom that he had never seen before, panic began to rear its ugly head. Blue eyes darted from the closed door to the windows, and then back to the bed. A breath he didn't know he was holding was released as he discovered the bed was empty. It also appeared that he had been the only one to sleep in it the whole night.

Matthew sat back on the bed with a plop. A ringing he hadn't noticed before was filling his ears. How much did he drink last night? A vague realization hit him that he had also done something else. "Oh crap. What did I do last night?"

"That's what I want to know."

The voice made the Canadian jump from up from the bed into a slightly defensive position, eyes wide, and body shaking.

"Whoa, whoa, take it easy Mattie! I got a call from Berwald and Tino that I should go look for you."

The blond boy flumped back to the bed once again. "Oh Soren…Thank god. I had no idea where I was, and I was so afraid that I had done something horrible."

"So, sleeping with me is something horrible?"

Matthew's eyes flashed open dramatically. "Oh dear, we did? I'm so sorry. I don't know what came over me. I'm so…."

The Danish man interrupted quickly. "Mattie. Breathe man. We didn't do anything." Matthew relaxed visibly. "I found you in the park, almost passed out, hugging a vodka bottle."

Blue eyes clouded to dark gray. The Dane watched his friend closely. "What caus-"

"Ivan proposed….to Alfred. I just couldn't handle it."

Soren looked to Mattie apologetically. "God Mattie…I'm sorry. That's just….really harsh. He did that in front of you?"

The golden blond nodded solemnly.

"Wow…." Was all the other could reply.

"Well…since that went to shit, how about we find some way to cheer your ass up?"

Matthew looked up still teetering on the edge of tears. What could do that? He had his heart cut from his chest and handed to him.

"Come on man! How about a game of hockey? We could get all the guys together for a good blood bath."  
Matthew winced a bit.

"Oh, yeah…not them. The others would probably be up for an impromptu game though."

The Canadian thought for a moment before nodding his head a bit. "Yeah….okay….but, I don't have any clothes." Realization then hit him. "Oh my god I'm not wearing any clothes! Soren what the fuck?"

"Hey, I said we did nothing. You were drenched in sweat and reeked of vodka. There was no way in hell you were sleeping in my bed that way."

A crimson blush painted Mattie's cheeks. Soren had undressed him and put him in HIS bed.

"You're wondering why you don't reek still?"

Matthew nodded his head while wearing a perplexed look.

"I showered your nasty ass."

Matthew's eyes widened and he grabbed a pillow from the bed throwing it at full force at the spot where Soren stood moments before. The pillow flopped gracelessly to the floor as the assailant screamed.

"DAMMIT SOREN!"

Raucous laughter was the reply to the screech. Matthew noted that the Dane had brought him some clean clothes and threw them on quickly and opened the door to the still chuckling Soren.

As Matthew had a small breakfast (toast to be exact), a large cup of strong coffee, and two aspirin, Soren began calling up the team for an "emergency" practice in two hours time.

It would be a long two hours for the Canadian. All he could do was rehash out the details. Ivan and Alfred were engaged. Ivan loved his brother and not him. Ivan had smiled, actually smiled a real smile, and held out a ring to his brother. It made him sick to his stomach.

Dashing out of the kitchen and into the spare bathroom, Mattie just made it before losing all of the food and coffee he had consumed. A few minutes into retching all of his sustenance he was aware of a large warm hand smoothing circles on his back and another holding his golden curls out of his face. It took his mind a moment to register the fact that he was also sobbing.

Soren looked over at Matthew with sympathetic eyes. Seeing a friend so broken was horrible. The hand that was previously holding back hair began sweeping rouge tears away.

"God Matt. I wish there was something I could do." The empathy thick in his voice relayed his honesty.

"Th-thanks. I j-just….d-don't ….." With that Matthew was again hunched over the toilet. After a nasty bit of dry heaving, he leaned back again. With shaking legs (and assistance from the Danish man) he stood and leaned toward the sink, desperate to clean the taste of bile from his tongue and his heart. A great deal of toothpaste and mouthwash later, Matthew felt slightly better, but still nowhere near happy.

Soren half carried the mostly limp Matthew to the bed. He was just about to walk away when a shaking hand gripped his shirt front. The words spoken were barely a whisper, but he heard them none the less. "Please. Stay here." The Danish man obliged and slipped onto the bed with a concerned frown. Matthew leaned his forehead onto the broad chest. "Can I just…..stay like this…for a while?" Strong arms wrapped around the shivering human form of Canada and for now, the two were content to just be close.

They sat on the bed for perhaps an hour before Mattie sighed lightly. "Thank you" was spoken gently, and before Soren could say anything against it, Matthew was up searching for his shoes. The Dane wanted to say something to his friend, but thought better of it and began his own preparations for going out as well.

The drive to the ice rink was very short. It was a nice facility, fairly new and rather spacious. Thankfully Tino had called and reserved the rink when he got the call from Soren. It was a nice feeling: Cold crisp air, fresh clean ice, and a way to bash each other around to let off steam. The Dane and the Canadian went straight to the locker room to change into their gear. Other members of the team began filing in to change as well. Tino and Berwald were the first to arrive after Matthew and Soren. As soon as the Finn entered the locker room, he raced to the Canadian and hugged him for all he was worth. Next a large hand patted him on the head. No words were exchanged, but nothing needed to be said. They all knew why they were there. Others filtered in slowly and prepared for practice.

Once all members of the team (minus two of course) were suited up and ready, they took the ice and began skating laps. Oh it felt glorious physically moving and taking all that anguish out on the ice and soon after the puck.

The joy was to be short lived though. After only an hour of ice time a loud shout was heard. "Hey! What the hell? You are practicing without us?"

Matthew turned toward the source desperately wishing that it wouldn't be true, but there plain as day was his brother…and Ivan.


	3. Chapter 3

**Hello dear readers. So sorry for the late update. I hope you enjoy!~**

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Mattie decided that the world really must be against him. Even when participating in his favorite sporting practice they HAD to show up. He did rationalize the thought that they WERE, well are, a part of the team, but still…no one had called them, had they? Everyone knew about his predicament. At least he assumed they did. He was snapped back to the present by a hand tugging on his wrist.

"Hey Matt, come on. Let's get out of here." Vidar's voice cut through the loud sounds that were filling the ice rink. Without absorbing what was really going on he followed the Norwegian to the locker room and sat down on one of the benches.

Vidar leaned against the wall watching over Mattie for the next several minutes. No sound was heard beyond the muffled shouting happening in the rink. Mattie vaguely wondered how long it would take the manager to get angry and kick them out for the day.

Both men jumped as the locker room door flung open and an irate looking Finn stormed in followed by the rest of the suited members.

Tino waited until the rest of them were in the locker room before lashing out. "Who the hell invited those two? Tell me NOW!"

"T'no. 'sn't w'rth 't." Berwald placed a large hand on his shoulder. Tino looked up to the Swede with frustrated eyes.

"Who would be so…unfeeling?" His anger dropped at the last word. It was obvious that it was painful for the Finnish man to watch others hurting. Perhaps the maternal instincts he felt for Peter were being directed toward Matthew.

The Canadian sat silently during all this commotion. Truth be told he felt numb. It was almost as though his heart could no longer feel joy or pain. That wasn't true though. Of course he could still feel joy…and pain. His heart still ached that Ivan never even noticed him. His heart ached that most people usually ignored him. A small part of him did feel joy for his brother's happiness, but it was still painted with the dark grays of unrequited love.

Whatever had been happening in the room at the moment was all a blur to Mattie. He noticed nothing. While the others were busily discussing how to remove the offending players from the team, Matt had removed his skates and pads, and was changing back into his borrowed clothes from Soren.

The Dane was nearby keeping up on the conversation, but all the while watching the Canadian intently. He really did have a soft spot for him. Oh hell, he liked him. Was it love? Well, that was something that he needed to find out, but how to do so? A brilliant flash occurred to him. A date; take Mattie on a date! Mentally patting himself on the back he finished changing as well only just before Matt did.

As soon as both had returned to standard attire they made eye contact and silently agreed that it was time to leave. Nothing was said to the team; both just walked out. Soren lead Mattie to his car and both entered, buckled up, and the Danish man drove them away from the current stab wound in Matthew's heart.

A few blocks down the road Soren chanced a glance at Mattie. He had his elbow propped up on the door, and his chin perched on the heel of his hand. Large blue eyes watched out the front window, not really seeing anything.

Noting that he was just a few blocks from his apartment, he decided it was now or never.

"Uh, Matt?"

"Hmm." Was the noncommittal reply.

"…You hungry?" He chanced another glance to the passenger.

"Mmm."

"You want to get some food with me?"

"Mmm."

The Dane frowned. He knew his friend was hurting, but this was bad. Matthew was never the type to be rude. His upbringing with Arthur had made sure of it, but even without prompting from the proper Englishman, Mattie was not the type to be rude. Soren continued driving a few blocks before trying to speak again.

"Would you mind getting food with me? I really would like the company."

Matthew looked up at his friend for the first time during the return trip. He noted the hopeful look and the lopsided smile. Soren really was being nice to him. Although it perplexed him a bit, he was grateful for the attempt.

"….sure. That'd be fine."

The Dane grinned at him and turned his attention back to the road. This was going to work out, he could feel it.

* * *

After trudging back into the Dane's living space and dragging himself up the stairs, Matthew made him at least grant him the time for a shower.

Matthew stripped down and turned on the water. A steady stream rolled down his body as he leaned against the cool tiles of the shower. Nothing was going right for him. His only desire was to catch a flight back to Canada. Back to normal….back to completely invisible. That way he could at least wallow in his misery without onlookers.

While Matt was showering upstairs, Soren made a quick phone call to a fantastic restaurant. It was all part of his plan to woo Matthew into liking him. Maybe.

After the Canadian exited a rather long shower, he toweled off and shuffled back into Soren's room to see the Dane sitting casually on the bed with two piles of clothes next to him.

"Here, I thought you might want to wear something a little more...fresh." The Dane gestured to the pile farthest from him. "I'm going to hop into a quick shower, and then we'll go get that food."

Mattie nodded wordlessly as Soren half sprinted to the bathroom, too excited for his own good. Beginning the dressing process, he noticed something in the pile that really shouldn't have been there: a tie. He looked at it quizzically before noticing the dress slacks and long sleeved dress shirt also. What in the world? He was about to knock on the bathroom door when it flew open and a mostly drenched Soren came bounding out with a towel around his waist. The Canadian blinked, surprised and was almost knocked to the floor. A strong hand caught him by the wrist and tugged him up, but the change in motion was too much sending Mattie slamming into Soren.

Matthew blinked owlishly from behind his glasses as he leaned into the Dane. It took him a moment to register the fact that he was pressed up next to him, and another moment to realize that neither was dressed. He began to scramble away from the blond Dane only to notice that he was lacking something somewhat important. Back in the doorway to the bathroom, lying in a heap, was Soren's towel. It must have gotten loosened when he caught him. To Mattie's horror, he discovered that his towel had also gone missing during the recent events, but before he had time to dwell on this, the Dane was picking up his towel and drying himself off as though nothing had happened.

"I'll be ready in about five. How about you?"

Several seconds were spent trying to piece together what had just happened before Mattie shook his head to focus and replied that he could be ready in that amount of time also. After re-drying himself, Matthew dressed in the clothes Soren was lending him. They were actually a bit baggy as he was slightly smaller and shorter than the Dane, but they were close enough to fitting that he looked very nice. Matt smiled at the black slacks and red dress shirt. How Soren. At least he let him wear his favorite color. The love of red and hockey weren't the only things they shared in common, but they were things that both could agree on at any given moment.

He was fiddling with his tie when Soren came up behind him dressed in a sleek blue and gray before Matthew noticed what was in his hands. Dress shoes. It hadn't even occurred to him that he would need them, especially if they were dressed this nicely. Nodding his thanks to the Danish man, he took them and slipped them on quickly.

Matthew followed him to the car in silence, yet silence was not what he was hearing in his own head. An internal battle was beginning. Questions were bouncing around that Matthew had no answer to. The first being: where were they headed?

Soren started his car fidgeting a bit out of excitement. He was starting the first phase of his plan! Take Mattie on a date. The other didn't really know it WAS a date, but it still counts, right? The Dane was so caught up in his thoughts that he didn't notice the odd look the other was giving him until several blocks later.

"Um….Soren, not to be rude, but where the hell are we going that we have to dress like this?" The Canadian queried, used to his idiot brother wanting to go to a fast food place when they went to eat. Those particular places require nothing beyond simply having clothing covering most of your body and the presence of some sort of foot wear. He had, unfortunately, seen too many people only just following that rule, which made stomaching the already disgusting meal that much harder.

A chuckle passed the Dane's lips and the only reply was: "You'll see. Trust me, you'll love it."


End file.
